Six Australasians will take their place in the first full field over 50’s major of the season when the Kitchenaid Senior PGA tees off in Michigan this week.

David McKenzie played last week’s Regions Tradition but that isn’t recognised as a major by the European Senior Tour making the Senior PGA the first full field Grand Slam event for the over 50’s in 2018.

McKenzie will be on hand again this week joined by Peter Fowler, Glenn Joyner, Peter Lonard and New Zealand’s Greg Turner and Mark Brown at the Golf Club at Harbor Shores.

Joyner is reaping the rewards of a good season locally where he finished third on the Ladbrokes Legends Tour Order of Merit.

While both Fowler and Mike Harwood were ahead of him, both had already qualified in other categories meaning Joyner was the leading available player.

While Joyner plays for the first time Fowler, Australia’s most successful European Senior Tour player, makes his ninth start in this tournament and fourth at this course where he has missed the cut once and has a best of T39.

He and McKenzie will be the favourites among the Australasians, McKenzie courtesy of some solid play last week in Alabama where two double bogeys on Saturday spoiled an otherwise productive week.

Peter Lonard has the best US credentials of the five making the trip to Michigan but a limited recent schedule makes form difficult to predict.

Lonard made his over 50’s debut in 2017 at the Senior Open Championship where he finished T3 and is a proven winner in the US though may not be as competitively sharp as he would like.

Turner plays an extremely limited schedule in the senior ranks but has an uncanny knack of paying well when he does tee up and a good showing this week would be no surprise.